Category: Kira’s Posts

The Story Has Come to an End

The end of this summer will mark the end of my current career and venture; The Wise Owl Bookstore will close on August 30th, 2013.  It’s a very bittersweet time for me: the store was self-sustaining for the most part, but there wasn’t enough profit to support my own bills and rent.  Plus, for the past half-a-year I’ve been missing academia — my time at Kutztown University was wonderful and informative and I have long wanted to return to seek my Masters.

I applied to the Kutztown English Grad Program in March and was accepted, and at that point I still felt like I could make a go of both school and the store, although the hours would obviously have to be shortened.  Then, I was accepted as a graduate assistant, a tutor in the Writing Center, a job which requires 20 hours a week in exchange for a tuition waver and a stipend (in addition to 9 credit hours, or three classes, per semester).  Suddenly the store was looking less and less viable.  Add to that the inevitable slack in business that comes after the holidays and before beach reading time really sets in and I was torn: continue to try to keep the store alive, albeit probably only on the weekends and with reduced hours, or close the store and throw myself entirely into college life again.  For better or worse, I chose the latter.

It may be a tough time for bookstores all across the world, but I don’t see that as being a main or even major contributor to why I decided to close.  I have no other income, so any profits from the store naturally had to go to paying my bills.  Book sales fluctuated, but there was definitely a reticence from people towards buying new books, and especially new books at full price.  Their idea of the worth of a book has been completely overtaken by Amazon’s very cheap but very monopolizing business model:  undersell every book and make up the difference with shipping and the sale of other items.

Make no mistake, the book industry is changing.  But I firmly believe bookstores are viable and necessary, and I don’t see them going away anytime soon.  Mine will, but others won’t, and the fact that mine becomes a statistic makes me more upset than the fact of it closing in the first place.  Books are thriving, and many stores are out there every day kicking butt and making money.  Just because mine, personally, did not work out for me doesn’t mean anything about the state of books.

I’m quoted in a Reading Eagle article on the closing as saying “were the economy more hospitable…” I would have kept the store open.  Which is partially true, although it was borne more out of a desire to sound succinct and also to end an interview I wasn’t in the mood to give than a thoroughly thought-through statement.  Sure, people don’t want to spend a lot of money.  Certainly in Berks County this can be true more often than not.  Sure, I’m struggling to pay my bills on what I make from the store.  And sure, those problems can be chalked up to an inhospitable economy, to some extent.  But I made a profit last year and I would venture to say I would have gone on to make one this year, if only marginally.  But to throw all my eggs in the ‘cheap human beings’ basket belies the nature of small business, and especially self-owned small businesses with no employees.  I took a chance that the shop would support me and itself, and it didn’t.  Now I move on and try something new, something that I already know I enjoy, and try to support myself editing or writing or even teaching if I get my PhD.  That is a new path and an exciting one and I’m looking forward to it.  Onward!

Fall is Almost Here!

I live my life around the changing of the seasons.  At the end of every Winter, I think Spring is my favorite season.  At the end of every Summer, I think Fall is.  Because I live for the middle-ground.  Not too hot, not too cold.  That’s my motto.  This past Winter, after weeks of half-cold and little snow, I was desperate for Spring.  Of course it was barely a few weeks before the stifling heat of Summer rolled around again — and this Fall, as with every Fall, I’m So. Very. Ready. for the weather to change again (and boy, has it.  I had slippers and a hoodie on this morning!)

I love Fall because of the flavors; the scents.  Spring has flowers, sure, and iced tea maybe, and warm breezes.  But Fall has pumpkin and cinnamon, nutmeg and leaves.  Hot cider, roasted nuts, apple pie, hay bales, mums, the sharp cold tang of the air changing.  It’s the season where soup becomes an acceptable meal again.  Where we pull scarves and jackets out of storage and snuggle under down comforters at night.  The nights get longer and the days get shorter.  Breezes turn to chilly gusts.  It’s the King of the seasons.

It’s the easiest season to own a bookstore in, I think, because there’s something so naturally simpatico about books and Autumn.  Maybe it’s the desire to “curl up and read” with big thick socks on and an afghan over your legs, with a big steaming mug of tea by your elbow.  Maybe it’s the smell of books, so compatible with the smell of leaves and the natural decaying of things that happens every year.  Maybe it’s all in my head.  Whatever it is, I’ll stick by it.  Books and Fall are a lovely team, and I look forward to the Fall-themed events we’ll be hosting at The Wise Owl this year.

I encourage you to check out www.wiseowlbookstore.com for more information about our Contemporary Book Club discussion of Neil Gaiman’s “Coraline” on October 9th, or our 2nd Annual Dark and Stormy Night here at the store, at the end of October, where local actors will read chilling ghost tales from centuries past!

Bring it on, Fall!

Summer’s End

As the summer winds to a close once more (the school-centered summer, not the calendar one) it’s funny to think about how the year is such a state-of-mind, depending on your career and your leisure activities.  For instance, I won’t be taking my vacation for another month yet, heading into October, because that was the cheapest time to fly and also because it’s difficult to close the store at ANY time of year, so I just bit the bullet and picked one.

I had a one-day vacay a week back, a full day in Beach Haven at the Jersey shore.  Lovely, slightly overcast, and with plenty of breeze.  I even did something I haven’t done since I was a kid and wave-jumped!  Usually I just bundle myself up in a chair and read for hours —  but actually taking advantage of the ocean was just as much fun as I remember from childhood.  And I’ve got the sunburn to show for it.

There are fewer faces at the store these days, what with folks heading back to jobs and kids heading back to school.  It’s just been me and the Shop Cat, He-Who-Is-Not-Yet-Named (although he will be Sept. 4th!), holding down the fort and dusting off the books (me with a duster, he with his tail).  We’ve got some really great events coming up in September here on the Avenue, though, so that should bring the crowds back:

  • September 8th: Penn Avenue Sidewalk Sale, 11am-5pm
  • September 15th: West Reading’s 6th Annual Fall Festival on the Avenue, 12pm-9pm
  • Wise Owl Local Author Open Mic Night, with special guest author James Rahn, 6pm-8pm (with live celtic harp music from 5pm-6pm!)

So it’s a great start off to a new season as I say goodbye to the unbearable heat and sunny days of summer.

Hot Weather and Doing Nothing

Well I’m 0/3 with writing my blog post on Fridays.  A sterling record!

It’s been hard to do much in my free time these past few weeks: I was on a streak of reading a lot of new books and that was great and made me feel like I was being a good little bookshop owner, keeping up with the times.

Then, inevitably, I hit the Book Overload — that point at which I can’t take in any more new information (for the time being) and need to do something else until the feeling passes.  Usually I read a palate cleanser: a book I know and love and preferably have already read a dozen times.  Books like this require little concentration on my part — I’m re-reading for the experience, rather than the content.  So that’s what I’ve been doing the last week or so, re-reading some old standards.  Right now it’s ENDYMION by Dan Simmons, the third book in a sci-fic tetralogy that is one of my absolute favorites.  But the times when I actually feel like reading it are few and far between.

It’s so hard for me to function when it’s hot out.  It’s probably lucky, for the most part, that I spend the bulk of my days at the store, where working is not an option but a requirement and the air conditioner is quite effective.  (Side Note: did you know that, colloquially, the British use “quite” to mean “average” or “a little” whereas we use it for emphasis, or to show extra emotion?  Makes me worry about having accidentally used the word in passing to a Brit and not realizing my statement wasn’t accurate in their mind to my meaning!) But when I’m not at the store, I tend to laze about.  Whatever takes the least effort is usually the thing voted for: Netflix or a movie.  I’m getting a lot of titles checked of my “To Watch” list, which is nice, but it does make me feel rather unaccomplished.

But I will have something to do tonight!  It will be my first time actually participating in That’s What She Said on bctv, and I’m looking forward to the experience!

More Great Reads for Summer

With the unbearable heat-wave we’ve been suffering through this past week or so, I’ve gotten a LOT of reading done.  Relaxing at home, insulated against the sun with the air-conditioner on full-blast: reading is the perfect way to spend an afternoon!

Some recommendations for the similarly inclined:

THE AGE OF MIRACLES

by Karen Thompson Walker

“The Age of Miracles” sets a coming-of-age story against the backdrop of the end of the world.  No nuclear bombs or alien invasions: in Walker’s novel, the world is simply slowing down.  The days and nights get longer, curiously at first, and then all-too-soon the fabric of day-to-day reality begins to unfold.  Julia is on the cusp of adolescence, and the true magic of this book is how seamlessly Walker parallels the turmoil of youth with the decline of humanity.  It seems like a ridiculous comparison at the outset, but the sparse prose and almost lyrical cadence of the novel creates a real thing of beauty: at times painful, charming, bleak, and hopeful.

A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES

by Deborah Harkness

By turns magical, romantic, and oftentimes surprisingly intelligent, this sweeping novel introduces a magical world tucked inside our own: a world where vampires, demons, and witches live side-by-side with humans.  The characters are well-realized, and the plot alternates between the sharp twists and turns of a hunt for a mysterious book, and fascinating discussions of the magic-folk’s origins: blending genetics, biology, and genealogy with fantasy in a really unique way.  Heroine Diana isn’t as self-sufficient as one might hope, but the novel balances her short-comings nicely with her academic leanings: she’s a thinker rather than a doer.  Recommended: and the sequel comes out this month!

Books and the Longest Day of the Year

 

Hello and cheers and how-de-doo.  I missed my Friday post last week (my first post, so I already have a fantastic track record here!) so I though I’d post on the longest day of the year!  This is NOT the longest post of the year, rest assured.

A lot of my days and nights are spent at The Wise Owl, my bookstore, shelving and rearranging and inputting titles into inventory and goodness all the dusting.  But in-between those times I manage some of reading.  That’s the fantasy everyone has about bookstore owners and booksellers: that somehow we just sit around all day and READ and the store just runs itself while we’re off in Narnia or Oz.  Not so, I’m afraid, though I wish it were.  The business-end of books is the most exasperating, and makes you second-guess yourself and your ideas more than anything.  A book sells well one week, but not the next.  You move a book one shelf over from where it’s been for months and suddenly you sell out!  There’s no rhyme or reason and you spend a lot of time worrying that everything is in it’s optimal place.

But BETWEEN all that, I do read.  A lot.  At home, in the tub, in bed, on the couch, at the store, on my head if I could although I don’t know why I would…

Right now I’m reading two books: an advance reading copy of HORTEN’S INCREDIBLE ILLUSIONS by Lissa Evans, a sequel to the fantastic middle-grade reader book HORTEN’S MIRACULOUS MECHANISMS, about young S. Horten who inherits his mysterious great-uncle’s magical workshop.  The first was lovely and quirky and fun and the second promises to be exactly the same!

I’m also reading CALIBAN’S WAR by James S.A. Corey.  This one’s a sequel too — I love science fiction, and the first one was a combination of a gritty detective noir story and an epic space opera.  It also happens to be co-written by somebody I know so it makes me extremely happy that his novels are getting the attention and accolades they deserve!  I’m about 50 pages in (out of 595) and it is already a thrill-a-minute, a real edge-of-your-seater.  A great, exciting read for a long summer day!